Archie Roach: ‘This history should be told’

An excerpt from an episode of the ABC TV series Blackout (1991) entitled Best Kept Secret: A Profile of Archie Roach, Singer/songwriter.

Here Archie talks about the pain experienced by members of the Stolen Generations, which is the subject of his iconic song 'Took the Children Away' from his first album Charcoal Lane (1990).

The interviewer wisely chooses not to interrupt Archie as the camera stays fixed on him in close-up. The effect makes his words all the more powerful.

Archie was forcibly separated from his family, who were living at the Framlingham Mission in Victoria, when he was two years old.

National media coverage such as this was vital in beginning important conversations about the treatment of the Stolen Generations. In 1995 a National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families was established. The report Bringing Them Home was handed down in 1997.

Notes by Beth Taylor and Adam Blackshaw